Too bad about 'Deadwood,' but you'll live

Tim Goodman

Published 4:00 am, Friday, June 2, 2006

Photo: Doug Hyun

Image 1of/1

Caption

Close

Image 1 of 1

-

-

Photo: Doug Hyun

Too bad about 'Deadwood,' but you'll live

1 / 1

Back to Gallery

When word filtered out recently that HBO was letting the actors on "Deadwood" out of their contracts -- essentially canceling the series without actually canceling it -- fans were not the only ones who were stunned. It was a strange move that surprised many in the industry because, well, HBO will be the first to tell you that "It's not TV -- it's HBO." What that slogan implies, of course, is that HBO does things differently.

Apparently not.

In the end, all roads lead back to the bank. And if there's any issue that places HBO squarely in the same realm as everybody else in the industry, from broadcast networks to ad-supported cable channels, that issue is cash. Whether or not it's TV or HBO is up for debate. But this isn't: It's always about the money. Some stories just have the same, sad ending, no matter where they play out.

But just because HBO acted like, well, Fox, doesn't mean it should suffer the whiny backlash of outraged fans. And yet, that's what's happening now, with Internet campaigns hell-bent on saving "Deadwood" and at the same time organizing the National Cancel HBO Day. The first is understandable, the second is asinine.

On the plus side, this is the kind of devotion and fervor "Deadwood" has aroused, with its Shakespeare-in-the-mud, swear-word-marathon mix of bloody drama and dark deeds of men (and hookers). HBO should be proud of that. It's the kind of series that gets people talking. And normally that's exactly the kind of series HBO wants, since word of mouth drives subscriptions, and subscriptions are more important than ratings to a pay-cable outlet like HBO.

Though the acclaimed foul-mouthed Western -- a magnificent drama, with nothing like it anywhere on the dial -- will start Season 3 on June 11 and run a full 12 episodes, that's the end of the run. Creator David Milch had always wanted to do four "chapters" of the "Deadwood" saga, essentially as long as the lawless town managed to keep itself a separate entity from God and country. And there was never any indication from HBO that one of its most acclaimed series would not return.

So the move by HBO caught most people by surprise. Although HBO has not officially canceled the series, chances of it surviving are slim and none and -- well, you know the rest of that story. While Season 4 is not an impossibility, once actors are let out of their contracts, any future work they take invariably leaves them unable to come back. Multiply that by an entire cast, and you can forget Season 4 (theoretically, the series could be salvaged at the 11th hour if Ian McShane, who plays Al Swearengen, would return; without him, forget it).

Why did this happen? A complicated set of issues that revolve around money, it would seem. The bottom line is that "Deadwood" is expensive to make, cannot possibly be cut for use elsewhere (even on ad-supported cable), would not be co-financed by any other production company in Season 4 (unlike the very expensive historical drama "Rome," where costs are offset by foreign producers other than HBO) and would require HBO to pay the "Deadwood" actors to sit around while notorious clock-killer Milch works on a different HBO series, "John From Cincinnati." Nothing dramatically new in all of that except, and this a big exception, HBO balked at paying the tab.

Welcome to network television, everybody! Here we cut corners to use as floatation devices when the corporate drones cast us off to sea!

And yet, why should HBO suddenly get frugal? That's the current mystery, which remains unsolved and is, for your purposes, probably unknowable. But both Milch and HBO are at least partially to blame here. Conventional wisdom is you keep a guy like Milch -- brilliant but scattered -- on a short leash or you might as well start tossing cash in the fireplace. Letting him keep two plates spinning seems indulgent and, given the result, disastrous. Though it might be hard to fault Milch for taking HBO's unparalleled creative freedom and largesse as a ripe opportunity, it's hard to buy into the notion that he had no inkling this one-for-the-other scenario might happen. Also, HBO did offer him a short order of six, instead of 12 episodes. He turned it down. Even if he doesn't like short orders, Milch has been around long enough to know that HBO is nothing if not pliant. Give them six, they'll eventually want 12.

But it didn't happen. And even though Milch is now reportedly trying to finance a big chunk of Season 4, it'll only end in tears. And you know the rule: No crying in "Deadwood." Which brings up the side issue to HBO suddenly acting like a TV channel with a working accounting department: Some people are so mad at HBO they want to cancel their subscriptions.

Now that's rich. The one channel that has almost never let anyone down turns off the cash spigot and people cry for blood? HBO may have a history of lavish spending and subsidizing works of outright genius -- "The Wire" -- but it's still a business. Viewers certainly have a right to cancel a service they pay for, no argument there. But at least anecdotally the reason people get HBO in the first place is to watch quality, noncommercial programming of the highest standards.

So now they want "NCIS"? That's a tough theory to sell. It's the cutting off your nose to spite your face sales gambit, and that's never very successful in the end.

It's fine to be outraged that "Deadwood" will leave too soon, that story lines will go unfinished, that everyone will suffer from not enough McShane in their lives. But if you cancel HBO, that means what, exactly? That you don't want to see "Entourage" or "Extras" or "Curb Your Enthusiasm" or "Big Love" or "Rome" or the last eight episodes of "The Sopranos"? This is a channel that doesn't launch many duds. Try as it might, Showtime isn't even in the same league as HBO. Only FX comes close. And you already get that. Two more seasons, possibly, of "The Wire" -- television's meatiest, most finely nuanced milieu -- and you'd pass on that? Just a reminder: Nobody else makes that series.

Of course, this is a theory not lost on "Deadwood" fans. Nobody but HBO would have made "Deadwood" in the first place. So would you take 36 out of a possible 48 episodes of brilliance -- or none?

By the way, Milch's "John From Cincinnati" is described as "surf noir," which sounds just as ludicrous as "Deadwood" did before anyone saw it. What if that turns out to be even better? Will you be happy with "Prison Break" on Fox instead?

Cancel at your own peril.

Latest from the SFGATE homepage:

Click below for the top news from around the Bay Area and beyond. Sign up for our newsletters to be the first to learn about breaking news and more. Go to 'Sign In' and 'Manage Profile' at the top of the page.